Hop hop hop hippety hop

There seems to have been a lot of bunnies popping up around here lately...Easter must be on its way!


Easter Bunny Finger Puppets -tutorial from the Purl Bee



Easter Bunny - tutorial & pattern from Revoluzza



Kids Toilet Roll Easter Bunnys - inspired from here



Kids Easter Bunny Cards - inspired from here



Hoopla - Hoop Love 2

So here are the first two hoops that I have made.

The first was inspired by the speckle name hoop I posted on here.....I knew as soon as I saw this that I wanted to make one, and its a perfect first hoop to do as you don't need to have any skill, just do crazy stitching everywhere around letters, easy!  I really like the way this turned out, what do you think?

The second one I made after finding a great tutorial over at Lime Riot about Felt Embroidery...I had the idea of using felt on hoops for a while but wasn't 100% sure how to do it and this tutorial showed me how!  She used fabric glue which I didn't have so I used iron on transfer paper instead.  This just helps to adhere the felt before stitching it on.  This little hoop is for my sweet niece's birthday...she received a Lala Loopsy doll at Christmas and loves it, so I decided to make a little picture for her wall.  Looks pretty cute huh?!  I'm now inspired to make other pictures using this method as its easy to do although a little fiddly, uses my favourite material felt, and turns out pretty darn cute.  I have lots of ideas floating in my head, just need to get them from there to the hoop...stay tuned!

Hoopla - hoop love

My latest pinning craze is embroidery hoops....I've never embroidered before but I have just seen so many gorgeous hoops around I couldn't help but start pinning.  I finally started my first hoop a couple of weeks ago and now have completed two, bar the tidying up bit at the back of them.  I'm really pleased with how they have turned out and am inspired to keep on making them. I love a craft that I can work on in front of the tv...thats my kind of multitasking!

Here are some of the gorgeous hoops that have inspired me:

A double hoop by the very talented Checkout Girl at Little Pink House

Speckle Name hoop @ Lines Across my face

Bunny by pillipilli on Etsy , her work is so gorgeous

Beautiful dandelion hoop @ SewLovelyNC

They're all so gorgeous aren't they....no wonder I had to go buy me some embroidery hoops and try it out for myself!  Next post I'll share my efforts so far, am working on a third one at the moment but not convinced its going to work...we'll see!  If you want to see more embroidery hoops check out my pinterest board here.

Crepe Flower Hanging Ball

Wow.....now this thing took some serious time to make...its relatively easy to make just time consuming!  I started this months ago {no it doesn't quite take that long - I'm not talking that serious!} and finally I  decided I needed to get the thing finished.

Lots of crepe paper, hot glue, and time and eventually I covered my stryofoam ball with beautiful purple flowers.  For anyone wanting to make one I followed the tutorial at House of Smiths. It is now hanging in my daughters room.....I did have visions of making a few of these but I think for the time being I'll stick with just the one!

Pom Pom Garland

I am slowly getting back into making things again after a very slow start to the year.  I have a couple of incentives to get things made now......we are moving back to NZ this year and will finally move into our own house in July so I can decorate away to my hearts content and we are expecting our second baby in August so now theres twice as much to be made!

I bought some wool before Christmas with the intention of making a pom pom garland for MissM for Christmas but morning sickness put all crafting on the back burner.  I finally dragged it out the other day and started making pom poms....we do have a pom pom maker but of course I couldn't find it so I just used my fingers to make them{see tutorial here for instructions on how to make}.  I had great fun making these although no matter how I wound my wool my fingers always ended up being squished together and slowly changing colour to resemble that of the wool! 

I made them in a range of purple tones...MissM's FAVOURITE colour and strung them together by simply threading a piece of wool through the middle of the garland.  I love how it turned out and it was a really easy project.

You will have to excuse the photo of them hanging up, the light was terrible and the walls look terrible {can you see all the bluetak marks on the wall - ekkk, any ideas on how I can get rid of those?}but the garland does look a lot nicer hanging up than the photo suggests.

Right I'm off to work on another purple project for the girls room....its one of those projects you almost wish you hadn't started as its very time consuming!  Hopefully will have some photos to share later in the week.

Flower Power - lovelies for the hair

Well I don't know where the last month has gone, which I guess is pretty common at this time of year.  Not great form when you have just started blogging to take a month off, but I just haven't felt like writing lately and my creativity seems to have dried up completely....not a great way to start the year but things can only get better!

Today I thought I would share some of the Christmas pressies I made for my two nieces, a little selection of hair accessories, because a girl can't have enough lovelies for their hair, now can they!

First up are these lovely little ric rac flowers, these look super cute and are really easy to make.  I followed this tutorial and then just hot glued them to some clips.

Next I made some flowers out of felt and t-shirt material using the easy to follow tutorial here, and then attached to some hairbands - easy!  You have to love the glue gun!



This flower clip was made out of felt and again armed with a pair of scissors and some hot glue was easy to make. The tutorial is here if you want to make one - I used a much simpler flower design (5 petals from memory), basically because it was easier to cut out, more petals would add more texture to the petals.  {On a side note totally love the pics for the flower on the tutorial, the baby is just too cute!}.



I had seen these rolled fabric flowers all over pinterest so of course had to give them a go!



Sew some circles together in pretty colours and you have yourself some lovely little clips.

I think this lot should keep some little girls happy for a while...now I just need find my creativity again so I can finish off making some for my own daughter!!

Getting ready for Santa

When you're a kid, Christmas can seem like a long time coming....nearly every day I'm asked if its Christmas yet!  So since I wasn't nearly organised or crafty enough to make an advent calendar I searched for a much quicker option.....and viola we have the Santa beard countdown stuck to the fridge, with a new piece of beard being added each day.

If you would like to print one out for your little ones, you can find a free print out here.

To also help get ready for Santa I made a personalised plate for Santa's treats on Christmas Eve.  I had seen the idea around the traps (here and here) and thought it was a cute idea, so I bought a couple of porcelain pens, a cheap plate and gave it a go.  It turned out really well and was so easy to do...just a matter of finding a picture and a font to use, tracing it on your plate and then drawing it on with the pens. If you want more detail on how to do it, I used this tutorial.   This one has been sent off to my nieces in NZ, and now I just have to make another one for our house.....and then make some goodies to go on it {Santa likes lots of treats when he visits our house!}